ABSTRACT
By modeling the mobility table in a particular way people obtain new insights into the process of mobility, changes in that process, and the interactions of the mobility process with changes in the occupational structure within one mobility classification or between two or more mobility classifications. The record of sociological mobility studies is paralleled by a history of statistical analysis in which occupational mobility has often served as stimulus, object, or illustration of statistical ideas. As an alternative to the Blau-Duncan interpretation, people think their multiplicative models yield a cogent and parsimonious description of occupational mobility among American men. Unlike its precursor, people's description does not reflect the shape of occupational distributions of origin or destination, but only the underlying patterns of immobility and exchange between occupational strata. Contrary to widespread belief, men of upper blue-collar origin are about as likely to end up anywhere higher or lower in the occupational hierarchy as in their stratum of origin.
